Edward Weston
Armco Steel

Armco Steel

© 1981 Center for Creative Photography, Arizona Board of Regents

Armco Steel
Armco Steel
ArtistAmerican, 1886–1958
CultureAmerican
Titles
  • Armco Steel
Date1922
PlaceMiddletown, Ohio, United States
MediumPalladium print
DimensionsImage: 9 9/16 × 7 5/8 in. (24.3 × 19.4 cm)
Sheet: 9 9/16 × 7 5/8 in. (24.3 × 19.4 cm)
Mount: 18 1/16 × 14 1/16 in. (45.8 × 35.7 cm)
Credit LineMuseum purchase funded by the estate of Caroline Wiess Law, The Manfred Heiting Collection
Object number2002.2635
Not on view

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Department
Photography
Object Type
Description

Edward Weston took this photograph at the American Rolling Mill Company in Middletown, Ohio, in 1922 while traveling from his California studio to New York City. The image demonstrates Weston's early departure from the Pictorialist style a soft-focus approach that aimed to put photography on a par with painting in favor of a more streamlined, abstract, and sharply focused aesthetic in picture-making. When he arrived in New York City and met Alfred Stieglitz, Georgia O'Keeffe, Charles Sheeler, and Paul Strand, among others, they influenced Weston to continue his exploration of Modernism in photography.


  In Armco Steel, Weston created a powerful and overall abstract composition. This effect is derived from the bold and dynamic vertical thrust of seven tall smokestacks that appear as one wide stepped tower, and from the interaction of the smokestacks with the curved and horizontal pipes, all against a background of factory and office buildings that themselves form a Modernist grid. This photograph symbolizes the power, wealth, scale, and significance of the steel industry in 1920s America.


 Weston was best known for his landscapes of the American West, particularly of the Northern California coast. Along with other important photographers such as Ansel Adams and Imogen Cunningham, he was a founding member of Group f/64. His influence was further extended by the publication of his diaries, in which he wrote of his aesthetics as well as of his life.


ProvenanceEx-collection Jean Charlot; ex-collection James Maroney, Inc, New York; Sotheby's, New York, ex-collection Frank Kolodny, Princeton; Gerald Peters Gallery, Santa Fe.

Bought by Manfred Heiting from Gerald Peters Gallery, Santa Fe, on 8/8/1989..
Exhibition History"Photography's Response to Constructivism", San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 1980.

"Edward Weston - The Home Spirit and Beyond", J. Paul Getty Museum, Malibu, 1986.

"Twentiest Century Master, American Photographs", Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.

"American Vision: Photographers from the West, Selections from the Manfred Heiting Collection purchased by the Brown Foundation for the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, at the Museum of Fine Arts Houston from August 23-February 1, 2004.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
Inscribed in pencil, recto of mount, lower left: "Pipes and Stacks"
Inscribed in pencil, verso of mount, but then erased: "for Charlot / with much appreciation in many ways"
Signed in pencil, three times: 1. verso of sheet: "Edward Weston / Ohio 1922", 2. recto of mount, beneath sheet: "Edward Weston / Ohio 1922", 3. verso of mount, center: "Edward Weston Mexico 1924"

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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